Laura Hutt, Author at Guy & Co

Strategic Marketing Solutions for Insurance Leaders

We’re thrilled to announce we’ve won our biggest ever pitch to be appointed as lead creative agency for the esure Group across their two iconic insurance brands, esure and Sheilas’ Wheels.

We fended off competition from global networked agencies, and will be responsible for creative strategy and integrated campaign delivery across the both brands. VCCP Media have been appointed as media partner and we look forward to working with them to bring our campaign ideas to consumers across the UK.

David Guy, Founder at Guy & Co, said: “esure is all about giving their customers confidence in how simple their brand of insurance is, and we’re thrilled to be appointed as their lead creative agency to deliver bravely effective results. It’s been a while since the Brands’ most famous work and we’re looking forward to the ride ahead.”

Gareth Haggerty, Head of Brand Marketing at esure Group, said: “Guy & Co share our excitement about the huge potential within our two sleeping giant brands. The team’s drive to create bold, brave, impactful work is a fantastic fit with esure’s desire to shake up the insurance sector and reinvigorate our iconic brands.”

Insights

Who wouldn’t want to work on a global mega brand? When people ask, “so, who do you work for then?”, they nod enthusiastically and share a story about swooshy trainers, high-flying airlines and sweet brown carbonates.

But if you don’t it doesn’t matter, because getting to work on truly ‘super-creative’ work is a vibe that can come from anywhere.

We love that maverick clients are alive and kicking across the full spectrum of brands. We see it in wi-fi to whisky, car insurance to carbs (potatoes!), pickles to pensions and all the way to the end of the line in funeral care. We love working with Marketing Directors who ask us to solve stuff, that like all great challenges, start out as rather big and un-figure-out-able.

The emotional intelligence of a brave Marketing Director fused with a joint desire to push for genuinely meaningful and distinctive ideas is what we crave. Open to setting a clear value on what success looks like – they embrace our counterchallenges and share one of our agency values – hard on the work, easy on the people.

These are the personas who push us to do our best work and share their ambition on where they want their brand to go in the near and not so near future. And when it all comes together, we get to the commercial value results we aligned on together – and that makes everyone happy – especially Finance Directors.

As we look ahead to brighter economic times, we gauge new client relationships and potential pitches way past the budget and the brand name. For us, it’s more about challenging each other to do things together that positively changes the game. That’s what really matters.

Want to chat to us about your ambitions?

Just give us a shout – we’d love to help give you the confidence to challenge for bravely effective results. The more un-figure-out-able the challenge, the better.

Guy & Co’s Decade of Creative Marketing Excellence

It’s hard to believe it’s been 10 years since we first opened the doors of Guy & Co.

October 2013 was filled with nerve-wracking onboarding meetings with our founding clients. We owe a debt of gratitude to Albert Bartlett, Edrington Group and Scottish Fine Soaps. They took a risk on us, and I hope we’ve repaid that debt with dedication and marketing ideas that worked. Those early days were the start of our agency journey, and lead to the bravely effective work we make today.

After surviving the first few years and achieving steady growth, we had a good look at ourselves. We wanted to know what was driving the great bits of work around the agency. Turns out, it was down to our innovative streak and curiosity. We were always hungry to learn what was effective and why. And forever looking for different ideas that could build momentum for our clients.

This came from our experience with innovation system thinking and productive creativity techniques. They lead me to the idea of integrating these systems into all aspects of our work. By 2017, we’d nailed how to be a creative and research agency. It’s been great growing a culture where we have the confidence to challenge anything. And have fun doing it.

Now, in this milestone year, I’m proud to look back at what we’ve accomplished.

We helped Edrington test, and bring to life, innovative new brands across the pond in Rhode Island. We helped to celebrate the fieriest Border Biscuit of them all on TV. We took a deep dive into the secret life of pensions with Royal London. And empowered Smokehead whisky to embody its brilliantly rebellious positioning.

Oh, and we produced Albert Bartlett’s most extraordinary TV campaign yet. Our cinematography needed to live up to our epic idea, so it only seemed right to use the same camera that shot the original Star Wars. Most recently, helping Go Fibre on the way to becoming Scotland’s leading full fibre telecoms network. Bringing Digby, a hardworking minty green hardhat wearing gopher, to life.

Of course, we all did it together. I need to thank our amazing team of strategists, creatives and client services. They share an innovative spirit and love for making challenging work that gets brands bought. A special mention goes to Cat Summers. Since day 1, she has been my right-hand gal and the Yin to my Yang.

Lastly, thank you to our incredible clients. You made it all possible. Each of you put your trust in us to crack marketing challenges year after year.

As we move into our 11th year, we have exciting projects with old and new clients on the horizon. There’s lots of gas in the tank and we’re raring to go.

If you’re scratching your head with an un-figure-out-able challenge, then get in touch at lhutt@guyco.co.uk. See how we can confidently bring brave effectiveness to your brand.